Alcohol dehydrogenases (ADHs; EC 1.1.1.1) promote the conversion of alcohols to and aldehydes or ketones, typically along with the reduction of nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide (NAD+ to NADH). ADHs are instrumental in the generation of important compounds having aldehyde, ketone, and alcohol groups during biosynthesis of various metabolites.
One class of alcohol dehydrogenase is methanol dehydrogenases (MDHs). MDHs, converts methanol (MeOH) to formaldehyde (Fald), may be used in an enzymatic pathway engineered into a microbe to enable MeOH as a sole carbon source or as a co-carbon source with other feed stocks such as, for example, glucose, dextrose, plant biomass or syngas, to produce valuable products. Microorganisms have been reported that metabolize methanol, and in some instances do so via a methanol dehydrogenase, and in even fewer instances produce valuable products. Increasing MDH activity will enable improved use of MeOH, improving MeOH as a sole carbon source, decreasing production costs, decreasing amounts of any more expensive secondary or co-carbon source, e.g. glucose, increasing product yields, and providing faster rate of MeOH use.